A Frantic Halloween
by Galbinus-Rayquaza
Summary: Sapphire Birch hates dresses. Very much. However, will she agree to wearing one Ruby made for her on the condition that he comply to a favor? Franticshipping, RubyxSapphire, oneshot


**A Frantic Halloween : Kiss Me**

**By: **Galbinus-Rayquaza**  
Pairings: **Ruby/Sapphire  
**Characters: **Ruby and Sapphire  
**Dedication: **All Franticshippers out there!  
**Rating: **A high K+.  
**Beta: **Arc Knight  
**Status: **Complete One-Shot  
**Disclaimer: **I don't own Pokémon.

Sapphire Birch idly watched as the clouds drifted by and as the sky resumed a studious vermillion hue, accentuating the orange rooftops of the clustered houses somewhere below the stark, grassy cliff the girl was stretched out on. She fiddled with her bouncy russet locks, watching the glimmers of gold that reflected off her unnaturally shiny hair with vague interest.

Pursing her cerise lips, she recalled the last several painful hours she had spent under the fierce scrutiny of her naggy traveling companion, the one and only Ruby. Her coffee-brown hair, although now securely wrapped in her emerald bandana with the exception of her frontal and side bangs, still burned from where the black-haired Coordinator had so relentlessly scrubbed. Shuddering, she remembered the vast amounts of strawberry-smelling shampoo Ruby had rubbed into her—and here, Sapphire quotes—"horrendously dry wood-colored hair."

She recalled that she had bitten back a sharp retort of, "Says the boy who can't live twenty minutes without reapplying his makeup. In the middle of the freaking Grand Festival."

Sapphire would have paid big bucks to see Ruby's eyes widen to the size of dinner plates. It had only happened once before, and that was when she had finally professed her crush on him. Of course, this was all three years ago, and before the Contest rules had changed to include the battling sections and the Grand Festival. . . the two friends had been too busy training their Pokémon to refer back to the confession.

Not that the girl hadn't tried—on multiple occasions—to remind him. Ruby had always dodged her attempts with clever changes of topics—usually to some battle strategy or other. Upon recollection, Sapphire noticed that Ruby was always oddly reluctant to dabble in intimate matters as such; she accredited this attribute to his troubled childhood, and didn't begrudge him much for it. . . her own childhood was not exactly as peachy as the various Trainer-Spotlight magazines made it sound like.

Sighing irritably, she scratched at her black and white gloves and repositioned herself more comfortably on the ground, adjusting her chartreuse fanny pack and contenting herself with observing the celestial tapestry. At that precise moment, however, the high, shrill voice of none other than Ruby pierced through the air.

"Sapphire! Sapphire!"

Curiously, the slim girl picked herself up from the ground just as the teenaged boy collapsed on the ground. Her upper lip twitched in amusement at Ruby's body positioning; it looked very much like he was begging her for something—his head was bowed down in exhaustion and his lean physique looked somewhat crumpled in the pose he was in.

"What?" She asked, forcing as much annoyance into her voice as possible. Still, she could help but feel a little bit bemused. However, all optimistic thoughts instantly fled her mind as her cerulean eyes registered the two different items clutched in Ruby's two partially-gloved hands: a scroll of professional looking blue paper Sapphire did not care for, and. . . _a dress._

"Sapphire," Ruby began as he pushed himself to his feet and towered to his full height of five feet four. (Sapphire at times wondered when the hell Ruby was going to hit his growth spurt.) "I made you a costu—"

"NO!" She shrieked, suddenly losing it. Tugging insanely at her brown side-bangs, she began rampaging around the grass-covered promontory, shouting abuse in an uncharacteristically feminine voice. Ruby wisely backed away, undoubtedly in fear of his own mortality. Still, didn't she _very pointedly _tell him that _no, _she did _not _want him to make her Halloween costume. Didn't she? _Didn't she?!_

"Chill, Sapphire!" Ruby called out in alarm, resting his hand firmly on Sapphire's bare right shoulder. She flinched at the oddly pleasant contact and noted that, while her hands were perpetually cold, his seemed warm all the time.

"Chilling," Sapphire huffed, trying to regain her dignity. It was a good thing that nobody else was around—all the children were, undoubtedly, busy preparing their own Halloween celebrations. An icy sense of despair fanned out in the pit of her stomach—oh dear _Arceus, _how she _hated _dresses!

"Now, er, I have to ask you a favor," Ruby began tactfully slowly. Fortunately for him, Sapphire did not explode on the spot. She waved her right hand to signal that he could continue. "I made you a, a, _costume, _as you can see. . ."

The girl's bottom lip trembled dangerously but she fought back any tears, steeling her heart for the worse of outcomes.

"So, uh, I was thinking that maybeyoucouldwearitfortrickortreatingtonight?" He asked, high-pitched voice escalating even further and quickening with anxiety. Sapphire ogled him blankly for several moments as her usually sharp mind worked to decipher his words.

"You're kidding me," She stated simply, folding her arms over her chest.

"No, I'm not," Ruby said, stubbornness forming in his voice. Sapphire pondered the possibility of continuing to shriek insanely and tear at Ruby's white-clothed black hair, but just before she was about to spring onto Ruby's limber figure, he quickly added, "I'll do you a favor if you do me this."

A mischievous glint appeared in the girl's cerulean orbs. "All right then. . ." She had the perfect favor formulated in her mind, though she had to pay for it with a piece of her pride.

**later**

"Oh dear Latios, I still don't know why I agreed to this. . ." Sapphire groaned as her knuckles whitened from clutching the plastic handle of her trick-or-treating bag so hard, even though she knew exactly why she agreed to it. Her layered crimson dress, though sweeping her ankles, made her feel oddly exposed, and she constantly glanced over her shoulder, but this action was rather difficult to do owing to the fact that Ruby had made her wear so many necklaces that it was hard to even nod with the weight of the (fake?) gold.

Said Coordinator was happily conversing with a young girl about the age of seven, whom Sapphire wished would just buzz off. A few moments later, however, the girl promptly dropped a few coins in Brendan's extended hands, and he plunged into a navy-blue pocket of his flowing azure 'prince' trench coat and pulled out a tube of shiny lipstick, handing it over to the girl. She thanked him and began running away, presumably to find her mother.

"You sold the girl _lipstick?_" Sapphire asked disbelievingly as Ruby professionally dusted his hands before readjusting the silver buckles on his magenta knee-high boots.

"Yes, she was asking for it," Ruby replied matter-of-factly as his female companion sighed in exasperation and push her brown bangs out of her eyes for the twelfth time. A 'Next in line!' was heard from somewhere in front of the long line of children.

Ruby and Sapphire made their way to the front relatively easily—Ruby sauntering importantly through the thick crowd and Sapphire shooting death glares to whoever crossed her path.

A large woman was handing candy out to the children in a large bucket. Sapphire's stomach growled hungrily as her blue gaze wandered over the myriad amounts of colorfully-wrapped toffees, and with all the barbarianism someone else would not have expected of a young woman dressed in an ornate red-themed gown, she plunged her gloved hands into the mass of candy and pulled out two handfuls of the sugar-ridden gems.

"Manners, Ms. Birch," Ruby said patronizingly, plucking a single piece of candy from the bucket as the large woman frowned at Sapphire as she stuffed ten toffees into her mouth, wrapper and all. A few seconds later, she spat out the wrappers and turned to distastefully face the black-haired Trainer, who at the present moment was critically eying her bulging candy basket.

"Let's go the next house!" Sapphire suddenly exclaimed, grabbing Ruby's hand and hauling him through the streets. Had she bothered to examine her friend's expression, she would have noticed that his normally ivory cheeks had flushed a flamboyant shade of bright pink.

**later**

It was half an hour past Sapphire's first sugar rush. Things were not looking very well for Ruby.

He had a very nasty ache in his right shoulder, which was doubly painful since it was the very same spot the bulk of the weight of his single-strapped backpack was placed. It was a pity that the only Pokemon he had bought along for the occasion was Zuzu, his Swampert, and Mimi, his Milotic; both of whom were incapable of immediately evacuating the area. He regretted not bringing his Kirlia.

Glancing over at the golden expanse of sea visible as a mere sliver over the equally orange rooftops of Vermillion City, Ruby wondered if he could make a run for it with his Swampert. He calculated that the distance to the beach was three miles, and after integrating that calculation with Sapphire's ability to run at thirty kilometers per hour, decided that he may as while resign himself to a very long night of running around.

"Trick or treat!" The female Trainer beamed, her pink glittering tiara practically sparkling with energy as she thrust out her trick-or-treating bag to the (understandably) apprehensive looking man clutching the large pack of candy in his two hands.

Ruby made a mental note to schedule more appointments with the doctor.

Sapphire bounced down the cement steps leading to the man's house, waving her capacious Halloween trick-or-treating bag around with much vigor, causing the practically bursting sack to almost fling its entire contents into the air. Left eye twitching repeatedly, Ruby glanced down at his own near-empty bag and felt his stomach rumble distinctively.

"Well, where're we going next, Ruby?" Sapphire demanded impatiently, scratching her frilly, cherry-red sleeves that said Coordinator had so painstakingly stitched together for her with the most bargain cloth deals he found in the city market.

"No idea."

"Feh, Ruby, you're _so _systematic tonight," The brown-haired Trainer remarked sarcastically, rolling her eyes to emphasize the point. "Seriously, what's wrong?"

Surely Sapphire had seen the way Ruby mournfully scanned her princess costume, his hardwork, and the way his gaze lingered on the sticky-looking hems of her sanguine gown, a palpably grieving emotion reflected clearly in his red eyes. She interpreted the way he traced his eyes over her voluptuous breast in the wrong manner, and promptly slung her bag across his head.

Fortunately, Ruby managed to evade the rather unanticipated attack. Horrified, he opened his mouth to demand an explanation, but Sapphire beat him to the punch.

"Why the heck were you staring at my chest?!"

"What! I was just looking at the disgusting state of my once impeccable dress!"

"Lying _pervert_!"

The two 'friends' had attracted the attention of quite a few passerby. Aghast, many mothers clamped their palms over their young ones' ears. Ruby tensed his muscles, readying himself for another attack on his head with Sapphire's twenty-pounder, and cursed the fact that she had absolutely no appreciation for works of high fashion.

His mind racing, he quickly grabbed a random piece of candy from his bag and unwrapped it with deft speed. Ruby then popped the toffee into Sapphire's agape mouth, and very luckily for him, she was distracted with the most fascinating process of. . . _ingestion._

"This is really going to be a long night," Ruby muttered under his breath.

**later**

They made their way through the congregating crowds for the next hour, Sapphire hauling Ruby around as such through the duration of her many sugar rushes, which, Ruby might have thought upon reflection, was perhaps not the best idea to provide her with such opportunity to indulge in candy.

The girl, however, after stuffing all thirty pounds of the candy inside her bag into her mouth and shot out a splendid amount of wrappers, turned to face a pallid Ruby who was occupying himself with studying her face and the amount of wrappers on the ground that had come out of her mouth. Perfectly applied lipstick had smeared around the area around her lips, and he looked as if he were watching his million-dollar masterpiece break into thousands of pieces before his very eyes.

"So. . . about that favor now," Sapphire started, turning coyly toward Ruby, slightly apologetically for forcing him to watch her display.

"Shoot," Ruby said reluctantly, as if he were suffering from some undeserved punishment.

"Kiss me." She stated simply, blinking her large eyes innocently.

"WHAT?!" Ruby said loudly, jumping up in his seat on the cement sidewalk halfway to their hotel in Vermillion City. A couple of passing pedestrians turned to observe the pair on the ground, and to the dismay as shown on his angular face, some even dared mutter 'young love.' For, despite his feminine idiosyncrasies, Ruby was still a boy, and confrontation still something he feared above even death or even the formidable public speaking.

"I'm asking you a favor. Kiss me." Sapphire repeated poutingly.

The fourteen-year-old teenaged boy eyed her sticky lips uncertainly. "Um. . . could you ask another favor?"

"No." Sapphire said, growing impatient.

"Um. . . fine, then," Ruby said, his eyes twitching insanely as he drew closer. Sapphire scented mint in his breath before he tentatively pressed his lips onto her.

Their first kiss lasted less than half a second—Ruby drew away as if he had accidentally touched something exceptionally hot or exceptionally cold, and Sapphire was left busying herself with preserving the small shivers that had crawled across the back of her spine. She opened her eyes, for she had closed them previously, only to notice that Ruby was looking at her with an odd longing expression.

Without warning, the boy leaned in for another kiss, this one lasting the first for a long time. She trembled with pleasure as he grabbed the back of her mass of brown hair, pressing her face closer against his so that Sapphire could easily smell his flowery shampooed hair.

Though in reality their second kiss was probably only ten seconds long, it felt as if it had gone on for ten hours. When at last Ruby pulled away, a longing desire gnawed at Sapphire's insides and she refused to open her eyes, refused to shatter the lingering tranquility that had somehow accompanied the kiss.

Oddly enough, the first thing that Sapphire said was not, 'You're a good kisser' or 'Let's do that again' or something predictable like that, but rather a blurting, rushed, "Why'd you kiss me twice?"

"The first one was a sample," Came Ruby's slick reply before he kissed her again.

**Author's Notes:**

**Nothing to say except. . . review, please? And should I change the rating?**


End file.
